CITY OF BONES

THE HOSPITAL HALLWAY WAS BLINDINGLY WHITE. AFTER SO many days living by torchlight, gaslight, and eerie witchlight, the fluorescent lighting made things look sallow and unnatural. When Clary signed herself in at the front desk, she noticed that the nurse handing her the clipboard had skin that looked strangely yellowish under the bright lights. Maybe she’s a demon, Clary thought, handing the clipboard back. “Last door at the end of the hall,” said the nurse, flashing a kind smile. Or I could be going crazy.

“I know,” said Clary. “I was here yesterday.” And the day before, and the day before that. It was early evening, and the hallway wasn’t crowded. An old man shuffled along in carpet slippers and a robe, dragging a mobile oxygen unit behind him. Two doctors in green surgical scrubs carried Styrofoam cups of coffee, steam rising from the surface of the liquid into the frigid air. Inside the hospital it was aggressively air-conditioned, though outside the weather had finally begun to turn toward fall.

Clary found the door at the end of the hall. It was open. She peered inside, not wanting to wake Luke up if he was asleep in the chair by the bed, as he had been the last two times she’d come. But he was up and conferring with a tall man in the parchment-colored robes of the Silent Brothers. He turned, as if sensing Clary’s arrival, and she saw that it was Brother Jeremiah.

She crossed her arms over her chest. “What’s going on?”

Luke looked exhausted, with three days’ worth of scruffy beard growth, his glasses pushed up to the top of his head. She could see the bulk of the bandages that still wrapped his upper chest under his loose flannel shirt. “Brother Jeremiah was just leaving,” he said.

Raising his hood, Jeremiah moved toward the door, but Clary blocked his way. “So?” she challenged him. “Are you going to help my mother?”

Jeremiah came closer to her. She could feel the cold that wafted off his body, like the steam from an iceberg. You cannot save others until you first save yourself, said the voice in her mind.

“This fortune-cookie stuff is getting really old,” Clary said. “What’s wrong with my mother? Do you know? Can the Silent Brothers help her like you helped Alec?”

We helped no one, said Jeremiah. Nor is it our place to assist those who have willingly separated themselves from the Clave.

She drew back as Jeremiah moved past her into the hallway. She watched him walk away, mingling with the crowd, none of whom gave him a second glance. When she let her own eyes fall half-shut, she saw the shimmering aura of glamour that surrounded him, and wondered what they were seeing: Another patient? A doctor hurrying along in surgical scrubs? A grieving visitor?

“He was telling the truth,” said Luke from behind her. “He didn’t cure Alec; that was Magnus Bane. And he doesn’t know what’s wrong with your mother either.”

“I know,” said Clary, turning back into the room. She approached the bed warily. It was hard to connect the small white figure in the bed, snaked over and under by a nest of tubes, with her vibrant flame-haired mother. Of course, her hair was still red, spread out across the pillow like a shawl of coppery thread, but her skin was so pale that she reminded Clary of the wax Sleeping Beauty in Madame Tussauds, whose chest rose and fell only because it was animated by clockwork.

She took her mother’s thin hand and held it, as she’d done yesterday and the day before. She could feel the pulse beating in Jocelyn’s wrist, steady and insistent. She wants to wake up, Clary thought. I know she does.

“Of course she does,” said Luke, and Clary started in the realization that she had spoken aloud. “She has everything to get better for, even more than she could know.”

Clary laid her mother’s hand gently back down on the bed. “You mean Jace.”

“Of course I mean Jace,” said Luke. “She’s mourned him for seventeen years. If I could tell her that she no longer needed to mourn—” He broke off.

“They say people in comas can sometimes hear you,” Clary offered. Of course, the doctors had also said that this was no ordinary coma—no injury, no lack of oxygen, no sudden failure of heart or brain had caused it. It was as if she were simply asleep, and could not be woken up.

“I know,” said Luke. “I’ve been talking to her. Almost nonstop.” He flashed a tired smile. “I’ve told her how brave you’ve been. How she’d be proud of you. Her warrior daughter.”

Something sharp and painful rose up the back of her throat. She swallowed it down, looking away from Luke toward the window. Through it she could see the blank brick wall of the building opposite. No pretty views of trees or river here. “I did the shopping you asked,” she said. “I got peanut butter and milk and cereal and bread from Fortunato Brothers.” She dug into her jeans pocket. “I’ve got change—”

“Keep it,” said Luke. “You can use it for cab fare back.”

“Simon’s driving me back,” said Clary. She checked the butterfly watch dangling from her key chain. “In fact, he’s probably downstairs now.”

“Good, I’m glad you’ll be spending some time with him.” Luke looked relieved. “Keep the money anyway. Get some takeout tonight.”